While the U.S yawns to World Population Day, you indeed can stop progress
By Fred Elbel on 12 July 2014
World Population Day is observed every year on July 11. Sadly, it recently occurred with hardly a whisper of recognition by the mainstream media, who are champions for ever-increasing U.S. population growth thanks to mass immigration.
World population Day was instituted by the United Nations Development Program in 1989. The date of observance was determined by the date of Five Billion Day - July 11, 1987.
Quick quiz: how many people now reside on our planet?
Answer: over seven billion. That's growth by two billion additional people in 25 years - in just one generation. And it isn't stopping. See the population clock and listen to the growth at World Population Balance.
Here are some population facts:
60% of the world's population resides in Asia.
17% of the world's population resides in India.
20% of the world's population resides in the People's Republic of China.
Yet the United States, with a current population of over 318 million, is the most overpopulated country on the planet. That's because of the impact of consumption and technology as expressed in the fundamental formula: Impact = Population x Affluence (consumption) x Technology.
The total ecological footprint of the United States is 9.4 global hectares per capita, second to the United Arab Emirates, with an ecological footprint of 9.5 global hectares per capita. But the U.S. has more people, so it's overall impact is greater.
As they say, "you can't stop progress," which is taken to mean that you can not stop physical growth of goods, services, and the actual number of people. Who would want to?
But you can stop "progress", and we did.
In 1972 American women voluntarily achieved replacement level fertility (2.1 children per woman). Population would have increased for a while due to population momentum, then it would have gradually decreased to a sustainable number.
The growth-mongers in the Chamber of Commerce went nuts! Where will we get more consumers and cheap labor, they asked? The answer, of course, was mass immigration, thanks to the 1965 immigration act and the seven amnesties for illegal aliens Congress has passed since then. The GOP bought in to the big-money agenda, hook, line, and sinker, as did Democrats, who squealed with joy at the prospect of more Undocumented Democrat voters.
Now, while millions of Americans are unemployed or underemployed, the demand for more (cheap) people remains, and growth continues unabated. Growth will stop, of course. We can't continue to infinitely grow within the bounds of a finite nation. Our supporting ecosystems are already overburdened. We're draining dwindling oil reserves from foreign countries. We'll either crash and burn or come to our senses again, as we did in 1972. Let's hope for the latter. Soon.
1. World Population Balance population clock.
2. World Population Day 2014 - July 11, Festivals of India.
3, US Census Department population clock.
4. U.S. population growth, SUSPS.org.
5. IPAT equation, Encyclopedia of Earth.
6. I = PAT, Wikipedia.
7. The Environmental Movement's Retreat from Advocating U.S. Population Stabilization (1970 - 1998): A First Draft of History, Roy Beck, Leon Kolankiewicz.
8. Ecological footprint map, Worldmapper.
9. Footprint Factsheet, Center for Sustainable Systems.
10. United States of America's Footprint, 1961-2003, Global Footprint Network.
11. Ecological footprint, Wikipedia.
12. The U.S. ranks 2nd in ecological footprint, Ranking America, 2009.
13. Video: Off the Charts, Rock Beck, NumbersUSA.